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Interior Secretary has a two-faced approach to public lands protection

President Donald Trump plans to visit Utah on Monday where he is expected to sign an executive order calling for major reductions in the size of the Bears Ears and the Grand Staircase-Escalante national monuments. The dramatically smaller sizes of the two Utah national monuments would be based on recommendations made by Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke.

As part of his review of national monuments across the United States, the Interior secretary did not recommend a reduction in the size of any in his home state of Montana. In fact, Zinke, who represented Montana in Congress prior to taking over as Interior secretary earlier this year, recommended that Trump create a new 130,000-acre national monument in the Badger-Two Medicine area of northwestern Montana.

Both Bears Ears and Badger-Two Medicine are of cultural significance to Native American tribes. But only one is in Zinke’s home state.

“Everything that Secretary Zinke does in Montana is 180 degrees from what he does to the rest of the country,” Center for Western Priorities spokesperson Aaron Weiss told ThinkProgress. “Montana gets special treatment because he would like to be governor there some day.” The Center for Western Priorities is a nonprofit conservation and advocacy organization for communities in the Western United States.

The Department of the Interior did not respond to ThinkProgress’ request for comment on Zinke’s decision to seek a new national monument in Montana.

Altogether, Zinke advised Trump to shrink the boundaries of at least four national monuments, none of them in Montana. Secrecy shrouded the Interior secretary’s review of the status of national monuments. The Interior Department has never made Zinke’s full report available to the public. The report, however, was leaked to the Washington Post in September. In the report, Zinke did not recommend a reduction in the size of the Upper Missouri River Breaks, the only national monument located in Montana on the list for review by the Interior secretary…(CONTINUED)

Interior Sec. Ryan Zinke, who is being investigated for his use of private planes on the taxpayer dime, is under fresh scrutiny for “mixing political gatherings … during official business.”

According to Interior travel records and other documents seen by POLITICO, the secretary has met with GOP donors and political groups more than a half-dozen times while on taxpayer-funded department trips, including a local Republican Party fundraiser in the U.S. Virgin Islands where donors paid up to $5,000 per couple for a photo-op with Zinke.

“Ethics watchdogs say Zinke is combining politics with his Interior duties so frequently that he risks tripping over the prohibitions against using government resources for partisan activity,” POLITCO reports.

Zinke’s trips do not appear to break the law. For instance, his visit to the U.S. Virgin Islands from March 30 to April 1 was an official trip related to the Interior Dept.’s role overseeing the U.S. territory.

But House Democrats criticized the secretary in a letter sent Tuesday that stated that Zinke’s travels “give the appearance that you are mixing political gatherings and personal destinations with official business.”

Zinke has spent about $20,000 on three charter flights since taking office in March but has dismissed the criticisms as “a little B.S.”

Meanwhile, the former Montana Congressman has also been on blast by whistleblowerJoel Clement, a senior official at the Interior Dept. The climate change expert, who was reassigned by Zinke to a completely unrelated office that oversees fees and royalty checks from oil and gas companies, has resigned from his position.

“Retaliating against civil servants for raising health and safety concerns is unlawful, but there are many items to add to your resume of failure,” Clement wrote to Zinke.

Those failures include “muzzling scientists and policy experts,” an “arbitrary and sloppy review of our treasured National Monuments,” targeting an Obama-era conservation plan for the greater sage grouse, and compromising tribal sovereignty.

Interior Secretary Zinke’s love of special interests on full display at the Hay-Adams

According to the $500-per-night hotel’s website, the Hay-Adams is a “discreetly luxurious hotel destination for discerning guests.” Unfortunately, Zinke’s open pandering and favoritism for the oil and gas industries is anything but discreet. During the event, Zinke confirmed that the White House intended to loosen up standards for drilling on public lands.

Chris Saeger, executive director of Western Values Project, had this to say about Secretary Zinke’s announcement:

Today, the public got a glimpse of Interior Secretary Zinke’s day-to-day life surrounded by lobbyists and special interests in their natural habitat. If Ryan Zinke remembered his Western values, he’d fight for public lands rather than the special interests that get almost whatever they want from the department. Instead, under Zinke’s leadership, the Interior Department has stacked the deck against the public in order to line the pockets of his friends in the oil industry.”

Zinke stacks the deck against the working American public

The Center for Western Priorities released the following statement from Executive Director Jennifer Rokala:

“Talk about stacking the deck. This committee is hand-picked to give oil, gas, and coal companies what they want while ripping off taxpayers. The committee members from ‘Academia and Public Interest Groups’ don’t represent a single public interest group. The political members of the committee represent Republican governors, while states with Democratic governors don’t get a seat at the table.

“When Secretary Zinke took office, he inherited a department that had already taken large steps toward modernizing America’s oil and gas royalty rates, ensuring taxpayers get their fair share for resources owned by the American people. Under his leadership, the Interior Department has rolled back all of those programs, and replaced it with an advisory group that has collectively dedicated hundreds of years to drilling and mining on public lands and waters without regard for our air and water, or the best interests of taxpayers.”

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